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Finished with his little self pep talk—he’d done pretty well for it being impromptu, Dante thought—he stepped into the elegant office where Vittorio had already made himself at home and was sipping what looked like scotch.
Probably the expensive bottle Dante had been planning to show off by opening today…
“Enjoying that?” Dante asked, deciding he was amused rather than annoyed.
“Yeah. I assumed you were saving it for me,” the older man replied with a small smile.
Good. Vittorio had a sense of humor. Dante could respect that.
As they talked business for the next hour, Dante’s respect for Vittorio Giordano only grew, and by the time their meeting was over he’d helped secure the future for both families.
Now he just had to tell Aurora about the deal he’d made with Vittorio. His bride would only get one chance to make a first impression, after all, and the old kingpin might want to chat with her at the reception.
Aurora wasn’t the type to have imagined her wedding day since she was eight years old, or to have obsessively made Pinterest boards of the colors and themes she would demand when the day came. She wasn’t the Bridezilla type, and so she felt more relaxed than she had any right to the next morning as Missy and Jackie helped her into the gorgeous Nicole Milano gown she’d purchased on Dante’s credit card the day before.
The house had been bustling all morning as staff made the preparations for the wedding. Dante had given her a head’s up that there would be many guests there who she’d never met before. It was important in this world for marriages to be seen, acknowledged, and respected.
The ceremony was going to be held in the gardens, which had become one of Aurora’s favorite places in the last several weeks. Dante hadn’t told her exactly how many guests were expected, but she was able to guess through the tittering of the staff rushing around that it would be quite the gathering, which didn’t surprise her. She’d been forced to attend enough events and weddings that she was well aware of the number of connections her family had. And those connections were all more than wealthy enough to attend a last-minute wedding in Milan.
Aurora was mostly looking forward to seeing Dante in his tux, and then seeing him out of his tux later that evening.
“Alright, girls, T-minus-ten-minutes until the aisle! Last minute touches!” The wedding planner whooshed out of the room as quickly as she had whooshed in, and Aurora took one last look at herself in the mirror. The hair and makeup artist had done a beautiful job, keeping her look minimal and not over-the-top, but classic and fresh. Her long hair fell in curls down her back, with half of it pinned up and woven with lavender from the garden into a braid.
“You’re stunning,” Missy said.
“Not as stunning as you two!” Aurora said, turning to look at her best friends in their floor-length lavender colored bridesmaids’ gowns.
“That’s true. We’re the real stars of the show here,” Jackie said.
The wedding planner whirled back into the room holding three bouquets. “Let’s go, ladies!” she ordered, handing each of them their flowers as they filed out of the room and down the staircase.
Aurora peered out the window at the lines of chairs set up facing away from them, and felt a little nervous for the first time that day. There had to be at least two hundred people in the crowd, and she recognized maybe five or six of them from time spent with her uncle when she was younger. Her eyes shifted to the beautiful wooden arch at the end of the aisle, which was covered in flowers, and then her gaze fell on the most handsome man she’d ever seen.
Dante was standing there with his hands folded in front of him, looking dashing in his tailored, dark gray suit and lavender tie. She could do this. All she had to do was focus on not tripping down the aisle and make it to Dante, and he would get her through the rest.
A string quartet began to play, and the wedding planner ushered Missy and Jackie out the door to begin their walk down the aisle. Jackie winked at her, Missy blew her a kiss, and then she was standing there by herself, waiting for her cue. As soon as her friends had settled into their spots, the music switched to the traditional Bridal March, and the wedding planner gestured to Aurora. She stepped out the door and the entire audience stood, turning to face her.
She didn’t see any of them, though. She stayed focused on Dante, his smile so broad when he saw her that it bordered on a goofy grin as she made her way toward him. She felt an overwhelming sense of excitement bubble up inside her as she took her place next to him, and he reached out to hold both of her hands in his.
“Dearly Beloved,” the minister began, and Aurora tuned him out to the point of earning a playfully scolding look from Dante when she didn’t repeat her lines right away. The audience chuckled, and Aurora blushed, tuning back in right as the minister said, “You may now kiss the bride.”
Dante wasted no time putting his arms around Aurora possessively and leaning in to claim her mouth her deeply.
The audience exploded into applause, and Dante whispered to Aurora so that only she could hear, “I can’t wait to get you out of this dress, my little bride.”
Aurora could think of few things she wanted to be doing less right now than making small talk at her reception when she could be riding her new husband’s cock.
One of those few things, though, was the delicate verbal dance she was engaging in with Vittorio Giordano at this very moment.
The problem wasn’t that he was the father of the man who’d helped set up Enzo’s murder—her own uncle had fired the eventually fatal shots, after all.
It was just that he was really, really old.
And really, really… Italian. Like a stand-up comic doing a Godfather impression Italian.
He was currently saying something about how much he was enjoying the cannoli, and he wasn’t saying it ironically.
Pull it together! You’re a mafia wife now.
